Truly Madly Deeply
by Saissa
Summary: What if Mac's actions in Sydney (Australia) forced Harm to look elsewhere for his own happiness. This is a new Alternative Universe. This is NOT a Harm/Mac shipper story. Some actions in this story may be perceived to be Mac Bashing. They are simply the consequences of her actions or inactions. Rated T for some language. Disclaimer - JAG belongs to Donald Bellisario, not to me.


_Authors Note - This AU starts immediately after BOOMERANG - Season 5 - In the year 2000._

_**Disclaimer** - I do not own any part of JAG. They belong to Donald Bellisario. I make NO profit from this story. _

In the week after Harm returned from Australia, he felt completely numb. Mac had flung herself at him, asking for a one night stand, and he had simply said not yet. He was only asking her to wait. They had just made their baby deal the year before and already she was wanting to move up the time table. The deal was for 5 years. Little AJ was born in 1999 so the deal wouldn't expire until 2004.

Harm wanted Mac to wait. But Mac couldn't wait. The very next day she was wearing someone else's ring, and playing tonsil hockey with him at the airport.

While Harm was devastated, he did make his decision. He had asked Mac to wait for him and she chose not to. She had chosen to move on with someone else. It took Harm a while to get over Mac's betrayal, but he eventually was able to let Mac go and move on.

He did hope that his friendship with Mac could be rescued but not right now - not while Brumby was still in the picture. So emotionally Harm stepped back from Mac and began to build steps of friendship towards another person. Another Navy lawyer he had met at the Pentagon.

The first time he had stopped in the doorway of her office and asked her if she was interested in meeting for some drinks and maybe dinner, at a location not normally visited by Navy Lawyers.

"Me, Sir? Are you sure you mean me? What about Colonel Mackenzie?" she protested half heartedly.

"Mac has chosen someone else, and I don't go chasing after engaged or married women. I also don't let others dictate to me whom I spend my time with, Commander. I would like to catch up with you and your life. It's been a while since we last crossed paths."

"Well, alright. As long as we stay away from Benzingers and McMurphy's." She knew that those were JAG hangouts.

"I'll pick you up at 1900 hours tonight."

"Certainly, Sir.

That first night was a surprise. She looked great in jeans and a T-Shirt that hinted at some decent curves. Harm took her to a small middle eastern restaurant. Harm had discovered that middle eastern cuisine was considered to be very healthy and did not have a lot of meat. He had also developed a taste for hummus and falafel. So Harm and his Pentagon lawyer talked and ate and even laughed, while getting to know each other.

They discovered that they both had similar tastes in music - Jazz, blues, easy listening and classical - and they both hated the loud pop, disco and rock and roll music, popular with the younger generation. He did not own a TV and she seldom watched it. He played the Guitar and she played the Piano. He spoke fluent English and rusty Spanish. She was fluent in three languages - English, Italian and Japanese. As for their families, they were pleasantly surprised to discover that they both came from somewhat well-off families, his in California and hers in Virginia.

They had some differences as well. He was an only child and she was the only daughter but she did have three brothers - all lawyers in private practice. One was in Washington DC, one in Boston and one in New York City. His father was dead and his mother and stepfather were all he had left of family. Her father was a third generation Italian American, with 5 siblings, and thus she had a lot of cousins. Her mother was born and raised in Okinawa in Japan.

Harm outed himself as a vegetarian saying that he did not eat red meat, although he did eat poultry and fish. She too did not eat much red meat - usually only 2 or 3 times a month and she certainly didn't chow down on the Beltway Burgers like Mac had done.

For exercise, Harm went running - usually 5 miles a day for his exercise. She did martial arts and was a black belt in karate, judo and aikido. She also swam laps as well.

"Martial arts? That's unusual." Harm commented.

"Not when you have 3 older brothers and you are tagging along after them. I wanted to do everything they were doing. Only they gave up the martial arts when they got to high school. I had invested lots of time and effort into my martial arts by the time I got to high school so I just continued with it. It also meant that I was not outside running around in the middle of winter." She made a subtle dig at Harm's chosen form of exercise.

At the end of that first night when he dropped her off at her apartment, he asked if they could see each other again. She agreed. She had heard many stories about this man. So far none of the rumours, matched up with what she had seen.

Harm saw his Pentagon lawyer as often as he could when he was in town. Sure there were times when he was away - like the time he went to Russia with Mac and found his brother. Brumby had not been too happy with Mac disappearing off to Russia with another man. Harm only took her because she spoke Russian and he didn't. Otherwise he kept Mac strictly at arms length.

The admiral threw an engagement party for Mic and Mac, which Harm chose not to attend. Mac and Harriet were both very upset with him for not attending.

As he explained to his pentagon lawyer on a date. "I don't understand Mac's thinking. Why should I attend an engagement party for a women who clearly chose someone else over me? Her fiance would not be happy at my presence, so I am not going to inflame things and make the situation worse. She has made her decision and she needs to accept it or deal with it on her own. Why she thinks I will come to her rescue, I have no idea."

When Mac arranged her wedding to happen on the same weekend that Harm's Flight Quals were scheduled to be completed onboard the Patrick Henry, she demanded that he be back in DC for her wedding. Harm said he would try but he made no promise. When the weather turned bad, Harm and his RIO Skates, were forced to stay aboard the Patrick Henry while Mac's wedding went ahead. Without Harm.

Mac did not have the mental strength to say NO to Mic Brumby. She still did not understand that Mic was a bully just like her father had been a bully. Mac fully expected Harm to come charging to her rescue, and when he didn't, she was extremely angry at Harm. Quite simply, Mac refused to take responsibility for her own actions.

Harm continued to date the lawyer from the Pentagon. By now they were deeply in love with each other although neither had actually said anything. One night in the summer of 2001, after a date when they were snuggling on her couch, Harm made moves to leave. She grabbed his arm, and said, "No. Harm. I would love for you to stay."

"If I stay, I will make love to you." Harm frowned.

She nodded. "I know. I want you too. I'm in love with you, Harm."

Harm's face broke out into the widest flyboy grin she had ever seen.

"I love you too. I was going to be more romantic about this, but I can't wait. I have never been happier than when I am with you. Tracy Manetti. Will you marry me?"

Tracy flung her arms around his neck and said one word. "YES."

Harm presented Tracey with a simple but stunning single diamond ring with 2 small emeralds - one on each side.

And then he finally kissed her.

In October 2001, right after 9-11 happened, Mac was sent TAD to the Guadalcanal. From there she took a detour to Indonesia and had a spot of trouble at the American Embassy. Around the same time, Harm's old academy classmate Sturgis Turner arrived at JAG HQ.

By November Tracy could no longer hide the symptoms of being pregnant and this was announced to Harm one evening unexpectedly. While having dinner at her place, she rushed from the table to the bathroom to throw up. Harm could only hold her long hair out of her face, and rub her back until she was done.

When she finally stood up on shaky legs, Harm picked her up into his arms and headed for the couch where he sat down, with Tracy still in his arms.

"You're pregnant?" he asked. She nodded, not wanting to make eye contact with him.

Harm used one hand to lift her face upwards.

"It is mine, right?" he asked gently. Tracy nodded again.

"So why are you not happy about this, Tracy. I'm ecstatic!" Harms full blown flyboy smile was plastered across his face.

Tracy hid her face against his chest and mumbled a few words. All he caught was Italian. Well that word might have been Catholic, but he definitely caught the words bastard and not married.

"Honey. We are already engaged to be married. If we hadn't made any serious plans before, we gotta start making them now. I love you, Tracy. I really do want to marry you." Harm whispered.

Tracy lifted her head and Harm could finally see her full blown smile as well.

That Christmas was an answer to Harmon's prayers. The Pilfering Petty Officer (whom Loren Singer had accused of stealing her bracelet) ended up staying with Carolyn Imes. When Harm found his Russian half brother at the Wall on Christmas Eve, courtesy of Clayton Webb, Sergei came home with Harm. At least now he had his Best Man. Harm and Tracy's wedding went ahead as scheduled in the first week of January 2002. Their wedding song was Truly Madly Deeply.

In May 2002, Tracy gave birth to Harm's son at Bethesda Hospital. The child was 21 inches long, and weighed 8 pounds. Clearly he had inherited his fathers' height. The boy was named Andrew David Rabb. But sadly Harm was unable to be present for the birth of his first son.

On the day his son was born, Harm was too busy trying to stop World War 3 from breaking out by flying a plane in front of a dirty nuke and leading it away from its target, hoping it would run out of fuel before it hit his plane. Two days later, Lieutenant Bud Roberts lost a leg in a landmine explosion in Afghanistan.

In October 2002, a new SECNAV is appointed. His name was Edward Sheffield. He used to be a Senator. He was also Tracy's godfather. He was well aware that Tracy was married to Harm, and yet he still assigned Tracy to JAG while Bud was recovering from his injury.

Tracy's job at JAG was to be a lawyer of course, but she had a second set of orders. On behalf of the SecNav, she was ordered to spy on the JAG staff. The SecNav was fully aware that Harm and Tracy were married and that she had just given birth to a son barely 4 months previously.

Admiral Chegwidden partnered Tracy with Harm, not knowing that they were married. The two of them deliberately suppressed everything about their marriage while at JAG HQ and on any official JAG business. Harm had never worn his wedding ring on his hand even though he was married. His academy ring had long since been moved from the left hand to the right hand, but no one seemed to take any notice of this action.

As for baby Andrew, Trisha and Frank Burnett had agreed to move to Washington DC to help with the baby. Frank found a house in Virginia where he and Trisha lived, and they raised the baby. Tracey and Harm made sure to spend as many nights in the house as they could as well as all weekends and holidays, when they were not on investigations or TAD's.

Shortly after Tracy started working at JAG HQ, she and Harm had been able to spend a few days in a hotel together in Naples, Italy while looking for a serial killer. They had used this time as a short honeymoon.

Tracy spent a total of 12 months at JAG, and while she knew it was wonderful to work alongside Harm, it was also horrible because the other lawyers ignored her and made her feel like the outsider. Only Harms presence had helped to keep her on an even keel.

Clay Webb asked for Mac to go with him to Paraguay. She agreed and went without telling Mic. He had been trying to set up his own private law firm in DC, but was not having much luck. When Mic found out, he went down to Paraguay to rescue his wife, and bring her home.

However, since Mic did not have any special skills, he blundered into the camp where Webb and Mac were being held and was also captured. All three of them were tortured. And only a phone call from Gunnery Sergeant Victor Galindez to the nearest US Marine corps detachement, got them rescued before they died. The Marines also destroyed the cache of Stingers they found on site as well.

Two months after Mac, Mic, Webb and Gunny were returned safely to the USA, Mac showed up at the JAG HQ office one day and asked to speak to Harm privately. They did so in his office.

"Why did you not come and find me? I thought I was the love of your life? You have been so much cooler towards me for a long time? Why Harm? What did I do?" she asked.

"You accepted Brumby's ring in Australia. That's what you did. And I don't go chasing after women who belong to other men. In Sydney I asked you to wait..."

"No you didn't!" Mac interrupted. "You never said wait. I don't remember you saying that word."

"OK. So maybe I did not specifically say wait. But I did say _Not Yet_. I wanted you to wait. The baby deal we had was only one year old. We still had four years to go and you did not want to wait. So, since you clearly showed that you were moving on with someone else, I made the same decision. To move on from you. Granted it took me a while to get over you, but I did eventually find someone else. Our baby deal is now null and void. I have a son now and a partner whom I love very much."

"What?" Mac screeched loud enough to be heard in the bullpen. "Who is she? You broke a promise Harm. You promised you would have a baby with me!" Mac's face was almost purple. She was furious.

Harm held up one finger "IF neither of us were in a relationship in five years, then maybe we could go halves on a baby." That was the deal but ONLY if neither of us were already in a relationship. And as of now, both of us are in other relationships."

"And you expected me to wait 5 years for you and not be in any relationship with any other man?" Mac asked scornfully.

"Yes, I did." Harm replied. "Was that too much to ask? We could have been using that time to get closer together, to get to know each other. I was in love with you Mac, but you broke my heart and chose another man. I chose to not compete with that. Since you had clearly let me go, I let you go as well."

"So who's the bitch you are with now?"

"You don't need to know that, Mac." Harm replied sadly. Mac clearly was still not ready to concede that she had lost Harm.

"So will we ever be friends again?" she asked wistfully.

"Probably not. Especially not while you are married to a jealous man like Brumby. Mic would get too jealous if he saw you with a male friend. So right now - we need to take a break from each other."

Harm shifted in his chair and leaned forward. "Mac, I would have loved to have been your partner in life and I would have shown you loyalty, if you had showed that same loyalty to me. But you did not do that. You chose Brumby and broke my heart. I am going to put a moratorium on our friendship and say that we not get in touch with each other for at least five years. Who knows where we will both be in five years time?"

"So this is goodbye, Harm?" Mac had tears in her eyes, as she tried to manipulate Harmon Rabb one last time.

"For five years at least. Maybe if we are still on the same continent, in five years, we can get together for coffee, as friends." Harm held out his hand for a shake.

"Not even a hug for old times sake, Harm?" Mac asked.

"Sorry Mac. I won't do anything that you or my partner can misconstrue as something else."

Mac shook hands with Harm briefly and then let go.

As she turned to leave his office, she was thinking sadly. 'I don't think we will ever see each other again, Harm. I have already lost you. You have the family you always wanted and you are not going to ever want to be with me. So I may as well cut my losses now.'

As she turned to shut the door behind her, she chanced a quick look at Harm. He was already reaching for the files in his In tray.

While Bud was in rehab, recovering from the loss of his leg, Loren Singer has been sent to the Seahawk to take over his position. Then her pregnancy was discovered. So Loren was tried for fraternization and conduct unbecoming. Harm asked Sergei if Loren's baby was his, and Sergei denied it. Saying he had only had one date with her and not gone out with her since, because she didn't seem to be very nice.

After Loren was transferred to San Diego, Tracy was sent to the Seahawk to continue the job. It was very hard for her to be away from her baby son as well as her husband.

When the Seahawk finally made port, 3 months later, Harm and baby Andrew, as well as Harms parents were at the wharf to greet her. She then told her godfather (the SecNav) that he must either transfer her back to the Pentagon or she would resign her commission and become a homemaker and mother. Sheffield transferred her back to the Pentagon.

_A/N - This is my base AU Timeline, covering three years - seasons 5 through 8. I intend to write some one shots of Harm and Tracy after Tracy is re-assigned back to the Pentagon. (The end of JAG season 8). _

_A/N - Renee was of course never part of Harm's life in this AU. _

_A/N - Title comes from one of my favourite songs - Truly Madly Deeply by Savage Garden_


End file.
